Ball...breaker groups? Heh

Ryath_Waylander

Just wondering, ball groups are a thing I see. It's quite annoying to be playing AvA and the map, when a ball group arrives and plays round and round the mulberry bush on the keep you're taking's walls. Sometimes two opposed ball groups pitch, they don't care to fight each other, just farm the players trying to take the keep. The annoyance factor comes in when you've taken the flags and repaired the doors, you waste time moving to the next objective as your keep remains coming under seige and getting rid of them is an annoying game of squashing cockroaches. I know it's just their way of having fun and farming AP. Has anyone considered forming 12 man groups, specifically to come fumigate the keep when your Alliance is being plagued by them? I know that I myself would actually enjoy the challenge if someone could teach us what skills to use and dedicate a group to this purpose. Would it be possible? I know as a solo or 3 person group you're probably going to be ineffective against a ball group but could ball"breakers" be a thing?

ShortTripToHell

I play in some sort of ball and I am certainly not the best(so take my advice with a pinch of salt). I think it should be doable, but aren't you creating a ball group to kill ball groups?

Ryath_Waylander

Yup, partially but the focus would be to assist your alliance to play the objectives, not just farming players. Sometimes a ball group arrives, farms the agressors until they get bored (or the ap it's giving them is too low? I don't know?) And then leave without even taking the keep.

Thraben

ShortTripToHell wrote: »

I play in some sort of ball and I am certainly not the best(so take my advice with a pinch of salt). I think it should be doable, but aren't you creating a ball group to kill ball groups?

It is a common saying that "only a ball group can kill another ball group." It is not true, though. In fact, in a ball group against ball group fight, the results are almost entirely predictable. The group with the better setup and the stronger Bombblade players typically wins in 9/10 cases. The weaker group only has a real chance when their raid leader outsmarts, overwhelms with numbers or ambushes the other one. When forming a new ball group, the reputation of the raid leader typically attracts players. That means, if someone creates a ball group from scratch, the player quality alone would ensure months and years of permanent defeats. So forming an "own ball group" is not a short- or medium term solution at all.

That being said, using a ball "formation" against a superior ball group is utter madness. If you want to stop a train, you don't put your own train on a collision course and hope for the best. The best groups typically switch to a more spread-out playstyle when needed.

Ryath_Waylander wrote: »

I know that I myself would actually enjoy the challenge if someone could teach us what skills to use and dedicate a group to this purpose. Would it be possible? I know as a solo or 3 person group you're probably going to be ineffective against a ball group but could ball"breakers" be a thing?

1. Group size: Ball groups are designed to withstand at least one bombblade attack. A single bombblade, bombsorc, bombnecro or bombstamsorc can only do the job if they are already busy with someone and something else.

a) To cope with that, you can form a guild whose members share a common aversion to ballgroups. If the info "ball group there" arrives, most players will then travel to the fighting place and wear down the ball group without any further coordination. The condition for this to work is that EVERY player is capable and willing to switch to an anti-bombgroup skill setup when needed.

Ungrouped setups that work are:

I) Any magicka class with Inevitable Detonation and Vicious Death.
II) A Bomblade
III) A StamNecro Bomber
IV) An Overload StamSorc with Mechanical Acuity and Borrowed Time.
V) A Duelist type Vampire player with Azureblight Reaper (and a lot of patience)
VI) A capable Werewolf.
VII) A Warden with the Ice Portal and lots of DAMAGE.

Individually, neither of those can bring a ball group down consistently. But when attacking the ball group independently during the same battle, the pressure will become to great to bear, forcing the ball group to withdraw to a choke-point, or the roof of a keep.

b)

I) The smallest counter-bomb group size is 2. A Necro and a Bombblade. The Bombblade's setup is pretty much standard with the exception that s/he wears harmony as jewelry. The Necro's task is to provide the Grave Robber Synergy, lower the damage resitance of the enemy group, and apply a Totem/ Borrowed Time, as well as to do some additional damage. Both StamNecros and MagNecros work in that role.

II) The next tactically important group size is 4. If you have a bunch of casuals/ of people with a useless duelling/ small scale skill setup, you wait until the ball group is camping at a chokepoint of their choice (like an outpust, or a rooftop), then three of you setup three (cold-)stone trebs who are targetting the same area. The 4th player waits near the target area, and calls for the salvo, then executes the survivors with his Ulti/AoE execute skill.

III) If your group size is 5, and they are all magicka classes, you can just throw a combination of Inevitable Detonation and Blackroseprison-staff- improved Elemental rings at them. Since you can do it from 50meters away, and they are crippled by their lack of ranged fire power, you might lose some players who are getting targeted, but THEY will lose everything sooner or later. Be aware of enemy Pugs, though, as they are more dangerous to you than the enemy ball group

IIIb) edit, because I forgot to mention it : If your group size is 5, and you are fighting at at least semi- casual level, you can create your own "Mini ball group". Such groups are the smallest medium scale groups in Cyro, meaning that unlike a group of 5, say, Stamblades, they are able to do more than just ganking other players, far more.

These groups consist of:

1 StamWarden (SubAssault, Frozen Portal, AoE Execute, Healing, Bone Shield)
2 MagWardens (SubAssault, Proxy OR Inevitable Deto, Healing)
1 MagDK (Rapid buff, Proxy OR Inevitable Deto, Talons, Orbs, Wall of Frost, Healing)
1 MagNecro (Purge, Proxy OR Inevitable Deto, Grave Robber, Borrowed Time, Healing)

Your main damage sources are synergies (you have to wear harmonious jewelry), SubAssault and the Detonation.You can also have up to 4 Storm- type ultimates. If you manage to do most of the damage within 1-3 seconds, you stand a chance against most ball groups IF you manage to surprise them. Be aware , though, that your healing will not be sufficient for a prolonged fight.

IV) A fairly optimized 6-person group is able to do all of the above. Of course you might be still outnumbered 2:1, but since they are crippled by their lack of ranged firepower, and since you deny them Vicious Deaths and AoE damage situations, you can stop them long enough for allied players to arrive. With those allied meat-shields occupying them, their wipe through one of the aforementionned methods is only matter of time. Be aware, though, that those random "allied" players are more dangerous to you than to them - never fight in melee range together with those walking Vicious Death detonators.



2) Other common misconceptions:

a) "Use Lightning ballistae/ Ice Trebs!" - Maybe they die from laughter if you try that.

b) "Negate them!" - A Negate without enough damage is worthless. Most groups almost entirely rely on Vigor/ Radiant Regen, and a Negate doesn't stop that healing. A BORROWED TIME would do, though. That being said, a Negate is useful to stop barriers and a synergy strike.

c) "Spam CC!" - Great God, no. There is a hierarchy of CC in this game, and you don't want them to be immune to good (decisive) CC. That being said, soft CC should be fairly useless anyway. These groups themselves typically exploit server issues with some sort of hard CCs, and so feel free to do the same to them. However, whilst they prefer to exploit unbreakable FEARS, your best friend is the FROZEN PORTAL skill of the Warden. Use it AGAINST their general running direction, and pull the group apart. The other good CC is the aformentionned Borrowed Time.

d) "They are bots/ bad players." They fight in a group skill setup. Many of them would most likely kick your ... when they could switch to their solo skill setup. That being said, yes, there are also groups whose players are not exactly known to be good small scalers.

e) "I will snipe- gank them with my awesome penetration build!" - Wall of Frost is a skill that makes the group virtually immune to projectiles. Bows fire projectiles, so....



3) Other true statements:

a) "Leave them alone, and they'll get bored." - True. Ball groups are easy opponents because you can win by refusing to fight. Just turn the flags back, and go away when they camp on rooftops. They can actually be quite useful for your faction to guard your border outposts against another faction, or to keep your scroll safe by denying the other faction access to it.

b) "Don't repair the outpost's Main Gate!" - Fear not the fact that you are trapped with the enemy ball group inside. Fear the fact that you are trapped inside with those "allied" 17k health bowtard Vicous Death detonators right next to you.

Ryath_Waylander

Wow comprehensive answer @Thraben. That is very interesting reading and insightful. I can see it's not so simple after all and you have answered a lot of nebulous questions and just plain ignorance I had on the topic. Thank you for taking the time to address so many points.

Crash427

Ballgroup vs ballgroup fights usually aren't a matter of who has the better bombers, it's who has the better shot caller and sorcs. Negates decide the fight more often than not.

Inev det is a joke. Anything with a cast time sucks in lag and you're usually not going to hit enough people with one to matter.

A single bomblade won't make a dent unless the group is already under a lot of pressure or is afk.

If you want to disrupt a ballgroup you have two main options. One is to put together a group of a couple bombers and a sorc. Even a single bomber with a good negate can make the difference if the ballgroup is already taking a lot of heat. It takes practice, patience, and some luck. That's more work than most people want to put in so the more popular choice is option two: bring 40 friends, spam knockbacks, lag them to death. All's fair in love, war, and Cyrodiil apparently.

Ocelot9x

Wanna kill a ball group with 6 people? 6 dk, 5 stamina wearing azureblight and crimson popping magma inside the zerg with 2h maelstrom and stampede, 1 mag dk in magma heali g them

Thank me later

idk

Pretty much any group that can do damage can be defeated with a knowledgeable leader that knows how to set up a team and a skilled group that will listen.

Josira

Ocelot9x wrote: »

Wanna kill a ball group with 6 people? 6 dk, 5 stamina wearing azureblight and crimson popping magma inside the zerg with 2h maelstrom and stampede, 1 mag dk in magma heali g them

Thank me later

For some reason Magma doesnt seem to work for me in pvp. its like the capping at 3% of max health part doesnt work,and I would get bursted down by one or two people when that shouldnt be possible at all. there is no way 33 hits can go off in the space of 2-3 seconds.
Especially with uppercut.
Wasnt sure what was going on there but I stopped using Magma Armor on my backbar shortly after

Thraben

Ryath_Waylander wrote: »

Wow comprehensive answer @Thraben. That is very interesting reading and insightful. I can see it's not so simple after all and you have answered a lot of nebulous questions and just plain ignorance I had on the topic. Thank you for taking the time to address so many points.

Feel free to ask other questions. Due to the length of possible explanations, I did neither say why some things work, nor describe the builds in detail.

The hardest thing to swallow is that when forming an Anti-Ballgroup- group that Stamina players are generally helpless and useless against those groups, PARTICULARLY when they are more experienced, Duelist- type players.

I mentioned that Azureblight Reaper works, but the main problem with it is not how to trigger the effect, but how to trigger the effect on (average health of the ball group divided by 6) players at exactly the same time.

The other stamina builds I mentioned are even more exotic (a normal Werewolf tank won't do; there are maybe 5 people on EU Servers who can play a good-enough Bombnecro, and even fewer StamSorcs who can kill groups with Overload), and I basically just mentioned them to give people hope.

Thraben

To keep this article alive (and in the vain hope that people might actually learn something from it instead of accusing ball groups), I will show here some builds that actually "work" in regular intervalls. As said above, no one should expect to defeat a ball group single- handedly, as they are good players who more often than not have far more experience in the game than you have.



1. The Magsorc

First things first, don't even try that on a usual engine guardian portsorc. Those guys don't have enough damage to make a difference, and will never have.

a) Equipment:

You need Vicious Death, Mechanical Acuity (could even be Heavy), and Balorgh. You need to use a lightning staff (I suggest a BRP one), or 2 Axes/ one Great Axe.

b) Skills:

Given that you already HAVE a source of Major Sorcery, you do the following:

Vulcanic Rune (/Degeneration) -> Inevitable Detonation -> Haunting Curse -> Ring of the Elements -> Light (Overload) Attack -> Mages Wraith -> Borrowed Time, then repeat.

In the very most cases, it won't be enough, but as a MagSorc, you have basically unlimited attempts.

c) recommended:
Shadow Mundus, Nirnhorned Weapons, being a Khajit, Race against the time, full magic damage jewelry

d)

I will now provide you with some details WHY it works unlike the stuff you normally do:

Ball groups have 5 layers of survivability: Immunity to Dots (Purge), Immunity to Soft CC (Purge, or a mythic object), Immunity from ranged attacks (Wall of Frost), Resistance to single player bomb attacks (via maximum health and oftentimes Gossamer), and a Healing over Time of at least 2000 multiplied by group size.

Noobs already fail to penetrate the first 3 layers - indeed, if you have good purge and a good Wall of Frost shield, the incoming damage of the group is already reduced by roughly 80-90% (depending on the combat situation).


So why and how is THIS different?
Short answer: Because it turns their layers of defense against them.

a) Dots: 3 skills in the rotation are purgable. So why are they there? - to FORCE the group to purge. The Purge activates the Inevitable Detonation(s), and since they run as a tight ball, the Detonation alone can do up to 12k AoE damage. And if they do not purge, they will still eat substancial AoE Dot damage from the BRP staff and the Curse and might be overwhelmed by b)

b) Why those single target damage skills? The frost shield and the purge can be overwhelmed at times. If they are, you want to stand ready to execute one of them with brutal damage, so that the Vicious Death does the rest. Remember: One Inevitable Detonation and 2 VDs are typically enough.

c) The correct counter to those kinds of attacks is to not purge and trust in massed radiant regenerations to heal more than the Dots do damage. Since you cannot do enough damage to kill one of them without their purge bot player's assistance, you need to interrupt this by using a Borrowed Time bubble. Borrowed Time will stop their healing for maybe one second, but more importantly, their purger will panic, and will most probably immediately purge directly after the stunfield, providing you with the mass detonation you want.

d) So what is Balorgh for, then? Sometimes you need to go all in and combine this with a Negate or a Meteor (or, if you are courageous, with a combo of Heavy Overload + Dawnbreaker).


It is important that you don't overestimate your chances. Port away when they become aware of you and wait for your chance. On open field, this will only work against really bad ball groups, but ball groups like choke points, and so do YOU.

Ryath_Waylander

Thraben wrote: »

To keep this article alive (and in the vain hope that people might actually learn something from it instead of accusing ball groups), I will show here some builds that actually "work" in regular intervalls. As said above, no one should expect to defeat a ball group single- handedly, as they are good players who more often than not have far more experience in the game than you have.



1. The Magsorc

First things first, don't even try that on a usual engine guardian portsorc. Those guys don't have enough damage to make a difference, and will never have.

a) Equipment:

You need Vicious Death, Mechanical Acuity (could even be Heavy), and Balorgh. You need to use a lightning staff (I suggest a BRP one), or 2 Axes/ one Great Axe.

b) Skills:

Given that you already HAVE a source of Major Sorcery, you do the following:

Vulcanic Rune (/Degeneration) -> Inevitable Detonation -> Haunting Curse -> Ring of the Elements -> Light (Overload) Attack -> Mages Wraith -> Borrowed Time, then repeat.

In the very most cases, it won't be enough, but as a MagSorc, you have basically unlimited attempts.

c) recommended:
Shadow Mundus, Nirnhorned Weapons, being a Khajit, Race against the time, full magic damage jewelry

d)

I will now provide you with some details WHY it works unlike the stuff you normally do:

Ball groups have 5 layers of survivability: Immunity to Dots (Purge), Immunity to Soft CC (Purge, or a mythic object), Immunity from ranged attacks (Wall of Frost), Resistance to single player bomb attacks (via maximum health and oftentimes Gossamer), and a Healing over Time of at least 2000 multiplied by group size.

Noobs already fail to penetrate the first 3 layers - indeed, if you have good purge and a good Wall of Frost shield, the incoming damage of the group is already reduced by roughly 80-90% (depending on the combat situation).


So why and how is THIS different?
Short answer: Because it turns their layers of defense against them.

a) Dots: 3 skills in the rotation are purgable. So why are they there? - to FORCE the group to purge. The Purge activates the Inevitable Detonation(s), and since they run as a tight ball, the Detonation alone can do up to 12k AoE damage. And if they do not purge, they will still eat substancial AoE Dot damage from the BRP staff and the Curse and might be overwhelmed by b)

b) Why those single target damage skills? The frost shield and the purge can be overwhelmed at times. If they are, you want to stand ready to execute one of them with brutal damage, so that the Vicious Death does the rest. Remember: One Inevitable Detonation and 2 VDs are typically enough.

c) The correct counter to those kinds of attacks is to not purge and trust in massed radiant regenerations to heal more than the Dots do damage. Since you cannot do enough damage to kill one of them without their purge bot player's assistance, you need to interrupt this by using a Borrowed Time bubble. Borrowed Time will stop their healing for maybe one second, but more importantly, their purger will panic, and will most probably immediately purge directly after the stunfield, providing you with the mass detonation you want.

d) So what is Balorgh for, then? Sometimes you need to go all in and combine this with a Negate or a Meteor (or, if you are courageous, with a combo of Heavy Overload + Dawnbreaker).


It is important that you don't overestimate your chances. Port away when they become aware of you and wait for your chance. On open field, this will only work against really bad ball groups, but ball groups like choke points, and so do YOU.

This is a genuinely fascinating insight. Thanks @Thraben .

Thraben

2. The Pull- Warden

I will show you now a video where a ball group infests a homekeep, and is being harrassed by a pull skill. There are hardly more than 5 players per campaign who are good enough (i.e. know the usual routes of the ball groups AND are able Stamina players) to do this with chains or silver leash.

Sharee wrote: »

I rarely see anyone else do this to enemy "immortal" zergs infesting a friendly keep, so its time for a bit of promotion. Chains away!

https://youtu.be/hSKjjpULHbo

BUT the same principle also works with the Warden skill Frozen Portal - the difference is that you don't need these particular areas (walls/ upstairs) to create enough space between the victim and his/ her group. The Frozen Portal can also be used from MUCH farther away, so all you need to do is to pull the victim against the opposite running direction of the group to create a gap.

There are a lot of possible skill/ set combinations that could work, but keep in mind that you have maybe 3 seconds to kill the player before s/he reaches the safety of his/ her group's purge and radiant regen radius (which is roughly 20 meters). A procset like Zaan combined with another hard hitting one might be the best solution.

The counterplay to this kind of tactic is to force every ball group member to use the skill mist form, or to use bombblades as some kind of rearguard. The rearguard option is only practiced by the top 3 groups on every continent, so the mist form option should be of greater concern to you - sets that do oblivion or fire damage are recommended.


Why this works:

Ballgroups want to fight their own fights away from the general zerg of their faction. This limits their ressurection options to camps and the Necro rez ulti. Since they are highly optimized, they don't have much redundancy in their group setup, which means that if they have lost more than maybe three players, they are forced to withdraw and cannot hope to continue fighting for much longer.

Ryath_Waylander

I have been having a bit of fun with the frozen portal but am still not experienced enough to read the changes in direction quick enough and I need to be more situationally aware. When that happens I get flattened. Of course it only helps when there are more experienced players around to take advantage of the tiny hiccups I cause. The ball groups are actually fascinating to watch, it's like a living thing. The werewolf or two in the lead are really effective with the fear disruptions.

milllaurie

Well we have done it a few times.
Once I was solo and a red mini ball grp (like 6 ppl, running ball setups, synergies and harmonics before they were nerfed).
The action took place at noon, so not competent groups in cyro.
I took it as a challenge and asked in my guild for specific people to come in specific setups. They were:
3 stamdens
1 stamsorc with negate (me)
One templar heal with nova.

It took us 2 tries to pull that off.
They key was to do our combo AFTER they make their offensive push. That way they are low on resource, ulti and HoTs are mostly expired.
Main thing is to count down the sub.
It looked something like this:
"Sub in 3, 2, 1, NOW, ultis in 3, 2, 1 NOW."
Streaking through them on the "1" before ultis. Most got one shot, one was chased down.

Qbiken

Realistically the only real counter to a ballgroup will be another ballgroup. Unfortunatly, majority of them all just avoid fighting eachtoher since none of them are interested in actual challanging fights. Watched the other day two ballgroups inside arrius just watching eachother after they tried to fight one another twice, both clashes ended in somewhat of a stalemate where no one really wiped. This ended in both of the groups just farming whoever bothered to come inside the keep to defend it (which weren´t many btw).

Ballgroups avoiding eachother and at the same time claiming to look for "good fights" are like 4 man premades in BG´s who only queue when they know there are no other premades online.

But reading the "counters" are just pathetic since there are so many tools that easily hardcounters any kinda of counter.

* Roots/snares?: Everyone runs snowthreaders and while I don´t have too much insight to what the ballgroup "meta" is, I can imagine pairing snowthreaders with a few Swift traits would be somewhat ideal. Snowthreaders is a big offender that should be adressed in my opinion. Having permanent immunity to roots/snares is way too strong for the small trade off of not being able to sprint.

* Negates?: Negate doesn´t do anything when earthgore simply removes it. In my opinion Earthgore shouldn´t remove ground based ultimates like standard or negate. No monster set or gear should have such a powerful "afk" mechanic for doing something simple as just healing.

* HoT stacking and purge cooldown has been mentioned several times over and needs to be adressed a well. But I don´t expect ZOS to do anything about it anytime soon.

heng14rwb17_ESO

GO BALL OR GO CRY !

Thraben

milllaurie wrote: »

3 stamdens
1 stamsorc with negate (me)
One templar heal with nova.

It still works, and might see a comeback in the non-procset- week.

I would replace the templar with a Necro, though, and the StamSorc (although I myself am one) with a MagDK in order to reach the burst damage needed. When the Orbs work again, Orbs + Talons + Grave Robber + SubAssault can be enough. A Negate + Port-Through can be replaced with a Borrowed Time.

Outside of the no-proc test weeks, Orbs have the additional benefit of proccing Azureblight Reaper.

Thraben

Ryath_Waylander wrote: »

I have been having a bit of fun with the frozen portal but am still not experienced enough to read the changes in direction quick enough and I need to be more situationally aware. When that happens I get flattened. Of course it only helps when there are more experienced players around to take advantage of the tiny hiccups I cause. The ball groups are actually fascinating to watch, it's like a living thing. The werewolf or two in the lead are really effective with the fear disruptions.

1. Surviving the thing:

Ball groups are fast, very fast, but typically cannot change direction quickly without losing cohersion; nor will they suddenly stop just to kill a single player UNLESS they feel safe and the player is dangerous/ a hate- telling jerk.

So if you targeted, and you are not yet trapped in an unbreakable fear, the best action is the following:

Dodge through them, then block-walk and heal, preferably not in a way that you have to pass all of them, so to speak pass them diagonally through their column.

What people don't realize is that Ball groups have a kind of minimum range for their main attack (either SubAssault or Proxy Deto) - so if you pass them too early they are often quite harmless. However this works better against magicka- based ball groups; Warden- based ball groups might still be dangerous.

Most people will try to run away instead, but since ball groups are oftentimes faster than a single player, this actually gives them more time to kill you without risking a turn, or a standstill.

2. Your particular Ball group

Are you sure those WW were part of the group, and not just leechers? If so...

The way you described it, one can immediately recognize this this particular group had glaring weaknesses, i.e. using Werewolves as a Fear bot, and even 2 of them. A moderately good ball groups will use Sorcs for that role or a MagBlade. This means that their Healing-over-Time value is sub-par, and that their damage output is not what it could be. With 2 Werewolves active, that means the core group is not larger than 10. This also tells you a lot about the inexperience of the particular ball group leader. I would automatically assume that this particular group is not particularly good under constant siege fire while turning the flag keeps - so "offer" them an outpost (Blks, Sej, Nik) and strike when they are most vulnerable.

An alternative explanation is that it wasn't even a real ball group, but a semi- casual PvP group. A ball group is by definition hardcore/ progress (which does not imply it can't be defeated by a semi- casual or even casual group, or a bunch of clever randoms)

Kory

It's creepy the way these players hold tight to eachother and kind of buzz around their leader or whatever. It's a little comical too.
But anyway, here's some tips from me. Let them siege. At least from my experience, ball groups can't handle it. Crush them with siege weapons and have some 1vX'ers and your fellow alliance groups nuke the stragglers. Obviously you need people to report them coming to the keep.
Also ball groups are scared of other ball groups, so surprise them with a counter ball group if there are any.

All this is suggestion of course lol, nobody is out there giving marching orders.

Jaimeh

Thraben wrote: »

I) The smallest counter-bomb group size is 2. A Necro and a Bombblade. The Bombblade's setup is pretty much standard with the exception that s/he wears harmony as jewelry. The Necro's task is to provide the Grave Robber Synergy, lower the damage resitance of the enemy group, and apply a Totem/ Borrowed Time, as well as to do some additional damage. Both StamNecros and MagNecros work in that role.

II) The next tactically important group size is 4. If you have a bunch of casuals/ of people with a useless duelling/ small scale skill setup, you wait until the ball group is camping at a chokepoint of their choice (like an outpust, or a rooftop), then three of you setup three (cold-)stone trebs who are targetting the same area. The 4th player waits near the target area, and calls for the salvo, then executes the survivors with his Ulti/AoE execute skill.

III) If your group size is 5, and they are all magicka classes, you can just throw a combination of Inevitable Detonation and Blackroseprison-staff- improved Elemental rings at them. Since you can do it from 50meters away, and they are crippled by their lack of ranged fire power, you might lose some players who are getting targeted, but THEY will lose everything sooner or later. Be aware of enemy Pugs, though, as they are more dangerous to you than the enemy ball group

IV) A fairly optimized 6-person group is able to do all of the above. Of course you might be still outnumbered 2:1, but since they are crippled by their lack of ranged firepower, and since you deny them Vicious Deaths and AoE damage situations, you can stop them long enough for allied players to arrive. With those allied meat-shields occupying them, their wipe through one of the aforementionned methods is only matter of time. Be aware, though, that those random "allied" players are more dangerous to you than to them - never fight in melee range together with those walking Vicious Death detonators.


2) Other common misconceptions:

a) "Use Lightning ballistae/ Ice Trebs!" - Maybe they die from laughter if you try that.

b) "Negate them!" - A Negate without enough damage is worthless. Most groups almost entirely rely on Vigor/ Radiant Regen, and a Negate doesn't stop that healing. A BORROWED TIME would do, though. That being said, a Negate is useful to stop barriers and a synergy strike.

c) "Spam CC!" - Great God, no. There is a hierarchy of CC in this game, and you don't want them to be immune to good (decisive) CC. That being said, soft CC should be fairly useless anyway. These groups themselves typically exploit server issues with some sort of hard CCs, and so feel free to do the same to them. However, whilst they prefer to exploit unbreakable FEARS, your best friend is the FROZEN PORTAL skill of the Warden. Use it AGAINST their general running direction, and pull the group apart. The other good CC is the aformentionned Borrowed Time.

d) "They are bots/ bad players." They fight in a group skill setup. Many of them would most likely kick your ... when they could switch to their solo skill setup. That being said, yes, there are also groups whose players are not exactly known to be good small scalers.

e) "I will snipe- gank them with my awesome penetration build!" - Wall of Frost is a skill that makes the group virtually immune to projectiles. Bows fire projectiles, so....


3) Other true statements:

a) "Leave them alone, and they'll get bored." - True. Ball groups are easy opponents because you can win by refusing to fight. Just turn the flags back, and go away when they camp on rooftops. They can actually be quite useful for your faction to guard your border outposts against another faction, or to keep your scroll safe by denying the other faction access to it.

b) "Don't repair the outpost's Main Gate!" - Fear not the fact that you are trapped with the enemy ball group inside. Fear the fact that you are trapped inside with those "allied" 17k health bowtard Vicous Death detonators right next to you.

This is some great advice, thank you for the write-up! On PCNA Greyhost there's such a red ball group lately lawnmowing through the map, and it's really hard to counter it when there isn't an equivalent group present. Soloers are all but useless if not on a bomblade set up, and they have good healing to mitigate siege damage. Not to mention because of they way healing now works, everyone else who's solo doesn't have good healing because now they can't get the benefit of heals thrown from allies, so it just compounds the problem. Every time they appear and I see a nova dropped, I just run for my life, because I know the ulti spam is coming.

Joy_Division

Qbiken wrote: »

Realistically the only real counter to a ballgroup will be another ballgroup. Unfortunatly, majority of them all just avoid fighting eachtoher since none of them are interested in actual challanging fights. Watched the other day two ballgroups inside arrius just watching eachother after they tried to fight one another twice, both clashes ended in somewhat of a stalemate where no one really wiped. This ended in both of the groups just farming whoever bothered to come inside the keep to defend it (which weren´t many btw).

Ballgroups avoiding eachother and at the same time claiming to look for "good fights" are like 4 man premades in BG´s who only queue when they know there are no other premades online.

But reading the "counters" are just pathetic since there are so many tools that easily hardcounters any kinda of counter.

* Roots/snares?: Everyone runs snowthreaders and while I don´t have too much insight to what the ballgroup "meta" is, I can imagine pairing snowthreaders with a few Swift traits would be somewhat ideal. Snowthreaders is a big offender that should be adressed in my opinion. Having permanent immunity to roots/snares is way too strong for the small trade off of not being able to sprint.

* Negates?: Negate doesn´t do anything when earthgore simply removes it. In my opinion Earthgore shouldn´t remove ground based ultimates like standard or negate. No monster set or gear should have such a powerful "afk" mechanic for doing something simple as just healing.

* HoT stacking and purge cooldown has been mentioned several times over and needs to be adressed a well. But I don´t expect ZOS to do anything about it anytime soon.

I've been playing on organized groups for 6 years on all three factions in multiple guilds and I cannot remember a time when my raid lead intentionally ducked a fight against another guild that was on the map. In fact, we spend time looking for / seeking them out.

If you see an AD group and a DC group at your EP arrius keep, you are absolutely right that we will basically do the /wave emote. We do this not because we are avoiding each other, we do this because we both want to get inside the keep and quite frankly would rather the other group do the boring work of laying down siege. I'm not sure why this is so hard to understand: the objective is to get inside the keep (and take it), attacking a group that isn;t even defending it is about as dumb of a strategic move as one could make. It serves zero purpose as 1) no defenders are dying 2) the inner isn;t being siege down 3) if they die, the NB just goes out and gets a camp and they're all back anyway 4) if we die, well, doh!

For those people genuinely looking for advice to counters, I would not listen to this poster's dismissal of roots & snares and Negates. While there are some groups out there that do run Snowtreaders, numerous groups have dropped them because the speed disadvantage is a very real thing against those guilds that don;t use them. The most annoying thing that could happen to someone in a ball group is to get rooted. Yes, they have purgers and the better guilds will still put a mobility skil on their bar because roots/snares are a very real threat. It costs resources to remove them and a purge will only hit half the group and might not even remove the root if they have many status effects on them (often the case).

Negates are potentially a very strong ultimate you can use against a ball group, but it's got to be used at a critical point in the fight (for ex. 1 second before the point of contact at whatever the organized group is attacking). Yes, an Earthgore might remove the Negate, but that Negate has already fulfilled it's function: many in the organized group won't be able to cast their ultimate when the Raid leader had in mind, the members already took a lot of damage (since Earthgore proced) and there was no purging done before that happened. It short, the group's coordination was disrupted. A common excuse group members will give to why they wiped was "couldn;t cast X because of negates." The last time I heard a complaint about meteor was 2016 when it could hit a player for like 20K fall damage on an elevation. Not all ultimates are created equal. Negate is very strong if used intelligently.

Ryath_Waylander

Thraben wrote: »

An alternative explanation is that it wasn't even a real ball group, but a semi- casual PvP group. A ball group is by definition hardcore/ progress (which does not imply it can't be defeated by a semi- casual or even casual group, or a bunch of clever randoms)

Well they were very cohesive and moved together in that tight-knit manner usually typical of a ball group, up and down the stairs, round the top avoiding the flags. We met them at least 3 times during the couple of hours I were on. Perhaps they felt free to use the WW's knowing there were more inexperienced small groups on with the group size changes?

Thraben

Ryath_Waylander wrote: »

. Perhaps they felt free to use the WW's knowing there were more inexperienced small groups on with the group size changes?

Yeah, that's possible. Or they were just trying stuff out.

Thraben

3.The Azureblight Reaper


Stamina classes are generally bad a fighting ball groups since their skills typically revolve around winning 1vs1 situations. An exception is the Azureblight Reaper.

a) class:
I would recommend a StamSorc, but StamNecro, StamWarden, StamDK & MagDK also work.

b) equipment:
You need the set Azureblight Reaper. That means that this build does NOT work when proc sets are disabled. Most will use a Mahlstrom 2hander, but this is not really required, just more fun. Malacath's Band is also a good idea since it decreases the amount of enemies you have to hit by 25%.

c) recommended:
Patience, and decent survivability. I would also suggest that you practice bombing flags against PuGs with it.

d) skills:

AR works only if you can manage to apply 20 DoT ticks to a number of enemies at the same time. Thus, you need preferably ground based AoE DoT skills.

There are 3 skills which are particular good here, because they have more than one tick per second:

I. Surpression field
II. Mystic Orbs
III. Shocking Syphon (and its morphs)

2 of them are StamSorc skills, so I stick with that class. But if you are a REALLY skilled Necro, you could combine all this with a Grave Robber self- synergy and Blast Bones.

As a StamSorc, you should have Hurricane anyways, and Razor Caltrops are also a no- brainer.

Those 4 skills together mean that your Azurblight bomb needs only between 3 and 4 seconds to detonate, which is a reasonable time.

Now you need a way the pin down your victims: The most obvious solution is to port-through, but a Borrowed Time would be more devastating. If it's successful, use an execute skill.

How and why it works:

Ground-based DoTs are not purgable. Additionally, a Negate AND a Stunfield are quite unsettling for an inexperienced ball group. However, make no mistake, the skill requirement is quite huge for that tactic. Definitely not something I would recommend a beginner player to try.

Vizirith

Thraben wrote: »

3.The Azureblight Reaper


Stamina classes are generally bad a fighting ball groups since their skills typically revolve around winning 1vs1 situations. An exception is the Azureblight Reaper.

a) class:
I would recommend a StamSorc, but StamNecro, StamWarden, StamDK & MagDK also work.

b) equipment:
You need the set Azureblight Reaper. That means that this build does NOT work when proc sets are disabled. Most will use a Mahlstrom 2hander, but this is not really required, just more fun. Malacath's Band is also a good idea since it decreases the amount of enemies you have to hit by 25%.

c) recommended:
Patience, and decent survivability. I would also suggest that you practice bombing flags against PuGs with it.

d) skills:

AR works only if you can manage to apply 20 DoT ticks to a number of enemies at the same time. Thus, you need preferably ground based AoE DoT skills.

There are 3 skills which are particular good here, because they have more than one tick per second:

I. Surpression field
II. Mystic Orbs
III. Shocking Syphon (and its morphs)

2 of them are StamSorc skills, so I stick with that class. But if you are a REALLY skilled Necro, you could combine all this with a Grave Robber self- synergy and Blast Bones.

As a StamSorc, you should have Hurricane anyways, and Razor Caltrops are also a no- brainer.

Those 4 skills together mean that your Azurblight bomb needs only between 3 and 4 seconds to detonate, which is a reasonable time.

Now you need a way the pin down your victims: The most obvious solution is to port-through, but a Borrowed Time would be more devastating. If it's successful, use an execute skill.

How and why it works:

Ground-based DoTs are not purgable. Additionally, a Negate AND a Stunfield are quite unsettling for an inexperienced ball group. However, make no mistake, the skill requirement is quite huge for that tactic. Definitely not something I would recommend a beginner player to try.

Azureblight debuff in itself is purgeable

Thraben wrote: »

3.The Azureblight Reaper


Stamina classes are generally bad a fighting ball groups since their skills typically revolve around winning 1vs1 situations. An exception is the Azureblight Reaper.

a) class:
I would recommend a StamSorc, but StamNecro, StamWarden, StamDK & MagDK also work.

b) equipment:
You need the set Azureblight Reaper. That means that this build does NOT work when proc sets are disabled. Most will use a Mahlstrom 2hander, but this is not really required, just more fun. Malacath's Band is also a good idea since it decreases the amount of enemies you have to hit by 25%.

c) recommended:
Patience, and decent survivability. I would also suggest that you practice bombing flags against PuGs with it.

d) skills:

AR works only if you can manage to apply 20 DoT ticks to a number of enemies at the same time. Thus, you need preferably ground based AoE DoT skills.

There are 3 skills which are particular good here, because they have more than one tick per second:

I. Surpression field
II. Mystic Orbs
III. Shocking Syphon (and its morphs)

2 of them are StamSorc skills, so I stick with that class. But if you are a REALLY skilled Necro, you could combine all this with a Grave Robber self- synergy and Blast Bones.

As a StamSorc, you should have Hurricane anyways, and Razor Caltrops are also a no- brainer.

Those 4 skills together mean that your Azurblight bomb needs only between 3 and 4 seconds to detonate, which is a reasonable time.

Now you need a way the pin down your victims: The most obvious solution is to port-through, but a Borrowed Time would be more devastating. If it's successful, use an execute skill.

How and why it works:

Ground-based DoTs are not purgable. Additionally, a Negate AND a Stunfield are quite unsettling for an inexperienced ball group. However, make no mistake, the skill requirement is quite huge for that tactic. Definitely not something I would recommend a beginner player to try.

Presuming that the ball group stays within range of those dots ticking. While theoretically it would be 3-4 secs it would end up being 5-6 secs minimum. Hurricane works well because it can move with you, razor caltrops would only amount to at most 3 stacks if the person is running at just 100% movement speed, ie treaders or purge, no rapids or sprint. If they hit off center is will be at most 2 if not 1 stack. Mystic orb will be at most 8 stacks again if the person runs straight through the orb at only 100% movement speed, no sprint or rapids. Siphon is going to be very hard to be able to get any decent stacks and requires some setup and will never hit much of the group.

If they have treaders and rapids, caltrops stack falls to 2 and orbs will do 4 if they literally go the diameter. 3m off center of each and it falls to 1 and 3 respectively. It's unlikely you will be able to build enough stacks on the first rotation. Coupled with purge it will be very unlikely that you will be able to pull off many dets within the group if any.

vesselwiththepestle

Ground-based DoTs will be removed by Earthgore.

If an enemy dies to Azureblight, would it proc VD?

Do Azureblight stacks from different players still work together? So it might be interesting to team up with another Azureblight Reaper, adding synergies + harmony to the mix?

Thraben

Vizirith wrote: »

1.) When it's purgable, it's a bug. It was specifically designed to be unpurgable. There was even a comment on this by the Devs somewhere in the PTS section when it came out - please test again and /bug it when you test it out and it gets purged. It was definitely unpurgable the last time I tested it against a ball group, which was in December 2020

2.)That's why you need both a Negate and a rather powerful hard CC. I didn't mention it specifically, because it's not something an inexperience play should even try; but your only chance to do this is on chokepoints they themselves choose like at the second flag of a small keep or at an outpost, or a ram - in short, places a normal player should avoid at any cost against a ball group.

The true problem is neither. It's the fact that - even with Malacath - you need 5 explosions AT THE VERY SAME TME. There is a workaround, though: When you use Azureblight Reaper as a solo set, you want it to proc as quickly as possible. This is, however, not even necessary here. I can very well imagine that a health based StamSorc Vampire just uses a combination of blood mist and hurricane to trigger the diserable effect: After all, it doesn't matter if it takes 4 seconds or 10 seconds, as long as enough explosions happen at the same time. (Duelist type Vampire player with Azureblight Reaper)

It might be even better this way: Everyone is being alarmed by a Negate, and an able raid leader knows VERY well what's going on when a seemingly noobish Stamina class players throws Orbs at them.

Thraben

vesselwiththepestle wrote: »

1. Ground-based DoTs will be removed by Earthgore.

2. If an enemy dies to Azureblight, would it proc VD?

3. Do Azureblight stacks from different players still work together? So it might be interesting to team up with another Azureblight Reaper, adding synergies + harmony to the mix?

to 1) And Earthgore only procs when the group takes serious damage. They won't take serious damage from the guy who uses Orbs and stuff, that's for sure - unless it's too late for Earthgore, that is. That being said, when the Earthgores are already raining, I would suggest that you try and separate single players from the group, as they are stressed anyways in that situation and are prone to making mistakes. Azureblight is more suited against unsupecting victims who think everything is under control.

to 2) Proc Sets don't proc Proc sets. But given that you use a lot of ground target Dots, some of them even on a tick <1 second, they will be prefered by the server. That being said, I'm not sure if it's a good idea, as both sets have quite a different array of conditions and YOU must survive as well. On the other hand, I was personally using VD on my StamSorc (when Implosion made us the best AoE execute class) for some years, so who am I to judge

to 3) Yeah, they do, but only the stacks, not the explosions. So you won't have more damage than alone, just the same damage in a more consistent and quicker way. 2 StamSorcs or 2 StamWardens can create quite a mess with it, but only at chokepoints, and they must stack extremely close to one another so that the 4-5 explosions happen at the same time (after 2 seconds). It is often easier to do it alone as you will need many attempts to make it work.

Thraben

ADDENDUM: Warden- based groups.

Until now, I more or less gave advice under the assumption the the ball group is a classical one, i.e. one that uses MagBlades and Magicka in general - as those groups are the strongest at the moment.

Things get actually more difficult in the No- Procset - week (s).


Because:

1) Almost all builds I showed you require Proc sets. Without them, Inevitable Detonation spam still works (okayish), but there are even fewer options for Stamina classes.

2) A magicka based ball group has clearly defined benefits and weaknesses; one of the weaknesses is the reliance on Vicious Death. We might thus see the return of Warden- based groups, who are much less vulnerable than magicka ones:

a) Negates don't do a thing to them,
b) and Inevitable Detonations also do less damage.
c) Furthermore, they are tankier per se, so that you need to overcome more than 60k virtual health (Bone shield, real health, Minor and Major Evasion, running Hots) before you start even touching them.
d) Not only that, StamWardens in a group skill setup are far from being helpless individually - so if you get in a 1vs1 situation with them, they actually might fight back with some success.

Their group composition is basically this, just more stamina- based, and more people in general, with some Purgers/ Healers added:

Thraben wrote: »

1 StamWarden (SubAssault, Frozen Portal, AoE Execute, Healing, Bone Shield)
2 MagWardens (SubAssault, Proxy OR Inevitable Deto, Healing)
1 MagDK (Rapid buff, Proxy OR Inevitable Deto, Talons, Orbs, Wall of Frost, Healing)
1 MagNecro (Purge, Proxy OR Inevitable Deto, Grave Robber, Borrowed Time, Healing)

So what's their weakness, then?

Typically, ball group StamWardens are not particularly good at what they are doing because they don't play a class they are really familiar with: they oftentimes

a) push too far, whirlwinding into the void
b) instead of turning around and healing the struggling supporter classes behind them.
c) They are also typically far worse in ranged combat situations than they could be if they were well trained (a well trained StamWarden can drive off or even beat a MagSorc in ranged combat situations).

-> To make use of it, Frozen Portal/ Silver Leash even becomes MORE important than it is against Magicka groups (who use mist form to get away): Chances are high that the StamWardens are immune to CC, but high are also the chances that they ignore the fact that their few supporter classes are oftentimes not.
-> Their attack relies only on SubAssault, Synergies and Whirlwind: So if you manage not to stand in front of them, you are perfectly safe.
-> They are more vulnerable to Dot- type sieges, particularly Oil, than normal ball groups.
-> Since many support abilites of those groups burden the few magicka classes they have, you can put up two Oil catapults (fire them and leave immediately, it reloads itself), and just debuff their stamina all the time in areas where they run in circles for too long. Of course, it will take some minutes to show any effect. When their magicka supporter class runs out of Stamina, it's all over sooner or later.


The lack of warden player skill and combat variety typically puts a strain on their group leaders who will hide in towers even against a small amount of zerglings. Leave them there. If they want to farm while hiding in a bunker, there is no reason to storm that bunker. Just ignore it.

Thraben

How can a LfG (PuG) raid defeat a ball goup?

Whilst the obvious answer is with numbers, there are other ways, too.

1) Firstly, the PuG raid leader should lead with a class that does most of the support work, as you cannot rely on the PuGs to do it.
I would suggest a MagNecro, as the class allows you to do most of the support (Frost Shield, Borrowed Time, Purge, Healing, Orbs, Blood Altar) combined with significant "charge" damage (Deto, Grave Yard).

2) Now call for more players in your group, but REQUIRE people to use the skills "Inevitable Detonation and a group Healing skill". This will be quite unusual, since ESO PuG raids typically demand nothing from the PuGs, but for the sake your own mental health, DO IT THIS WAY. It's better to have a PuG raid of three who are actually effective than to have 11 bowtards who either light attack the gates, or zerg Roe while their group leader is at KC.

3) -> the result is, that even if some people in the group do not have what you require, you still are able to put up a fight: the best way to make use of Inevitable Detonation is to fight individually, somewhat away from the crown, and since PuGs are naturally inclined to do that it is hard to bomb your group whilst it is quite easy to severely damage the ball group, who stack at their crown and coordinate your salvo by using Purge. Whoever in your group has no Deto should be sent sieging, as Sieges are suddenly useful as long as the looming threat of an Inevitable Detonation mass explosion risks the ball group's life.

-> Of course, chances are not in your favor, as they communicate and you can't (quick enough). But you can put up a fight at least.